The Best Military Science Fiction of the 20th Century Read Free Page B

glacial forty-hour darkness of northern Norstad was crawling toward midnight.
    Stars glittered mercilessly keen in an emptiness which seemed like crystal, which seemed about to ring thinly in contracting anguish under the cold. Ostarik, the companion planet, stood low to the south, a gibbous moon of steely blue; it never moved in that sky, the two worlds forever faced each other, the windy white peaks of one glaring at the warm lazy seas of the other. Northward, a great curtain of aurora flapped halfway around the cragged horizon.
    From this dizzy height, Unduma could see little of the town Drakenstane: a few high-peaked roofs and small glowing windows, lamps lonesome above frozen streets. There wasn’t much to see anyhow—no big cities on either planet, only the small towns which had grown from scattered thorps, each clustered humbly about the manor of its lord. Beyond lay winter fields, climbing up the valley walls to the hard green blink of glaciers. It must be blowing out there, he saw snowdevils chase ghostly across the blue-tinged desolation.
    Rusch spoke roughly: “Not much of a planet we’ve got here, is it? Out on the far end of nowhere, a thousand light-years from your precious Earth, and right in the middle of a glacial epoch. Have you ever wondered why we don’t set up weather-control stations and give this world a decent climate?”
    “Well,” began Unduma, “of course, the exigencies of—”
    “Of war.” Rusch sent his hand upward in a chopping motion, to sweep around the alien constellations. Among them burned Polaris, less than thirty parsecs away, huge and cruelly bright. “We never had a chance. Every time we thought we could begin, there would be war, usually with Kolresh, and the labor and materials would have to go for that. Once, about two centuries back, we did actually get stations established, it was even beginning to warm up a little. Kolresh blasted them off the map.
    “Norstad was settled eight hundred years ago. For seven of those centuries, we’ve had Kolresh at our throats. Do you wonder if we’ve grown tired?”
    “My lord, I…I can sympathize,” said Unduma awkwardly. “I am not ignorant of your heroic history. But it would seem to me…after all, Earth has also fought—”
    “At a range of a thousand light-years!” jeered Rusch. “The forgotten war. A few underpaid patrolmen in obsolete rustbucket ships to defend unimportant outposts from sporadic Kolreshite raids. We live on their borders!”
    “It would certainly appear, your lordship, that Kolresh is your natural enemy,” said Unduma. “As indeed it is of all Civilization of Homo sapiens himself. What I cannot credit are the, ah, the rumors of an, er, alliance—”
    “And why shouldn’t we?” snarled Rusch. “For seven hundred years we’ve held them at bay, while your precious so-called Civilization grew fat behind a wall of our dead young men. The temptation to recoup some of our losses by helping Kolresh conquer Earth is very strong!”
    “You don’t mean it!” The breath rushed from Unduma’s lungs.
    The other man’s face was like carved bone. “Don’t jump to conclusions,” he answered. “I merely point out that from our side there’s a good deal to be said for such a policy. Now if Earth is prepared to make a different policy worth our while—do you understand? Nothing is going to happen in the immediate future. You have time to think about it.”
    “I would have to…communicate with my government,” whispered Unduma.
    “Of course,” said Rusch. His bootheels clacked on the floor as he went back to his desk. “I’ve had a memorandum prepared for you, an unofficial informal sort of protocol, points which his majesty’s government would like to make the basis of negotiations with the Terrestrial Federation. Ah, here!” He picked up a bulky folio. “I suggest you take a leave of absence, your excellency, go home and show your superiors this, ah—”
    “Ultimatum,” said Unduma in a